.37 M6 
 
D 639 
 .S7 MS 
 Copy 1 
 
 lanoi 
 
 Experiences 
 
 in the 
 
 German 
 Espionage 
 
 By 
 
 M 
 
 WHY I DESERTED THE 
 KAISER'S SECRET SERVICE 
 AND CAME TO AMERICA, AFTER 
 PERILOUS JOURNEY FROM 
 SOUTH AFRICA, THROUGH ENG- 
 LAND AND HOLLAND TO GER- 
 MANY AND OUT AGAIN, OVER 
 ROTTERDAM AND LONDON, 
 DURING THE GREAT WAR. 
 
 Copyright. 1910. 
 

 
 MY EXPERIENCES IN THE GERMAN 
 ESPIONAGE 
 
 It took one of your American humorists to 
 invent a man so bold and reckless that he made 
 even himself afraid. And it took me, your 
 humble servant, to be that man ! 
 
 At least, I am inclined to believe so, as I look 
 back over the last two years and review all the 
 perils to which I voluntarily exposed myself 
 during that period. For what reason ? Solely 
 for the pleasure and excitement of going 
 through them, as far as I can make out. 
 
 I am thirty-two years old. I am German- 
 born, of decent family and decent education. 
 Since I was seventeen, South Africa has been 
 my home. Some ten years ago my tastes led 
 me to take up detective work, and whatever 
 ability I possessed, coupled with hard work, 
 has made me head of one of the principal de- 
 tective agencies in that quarter of the world, 
 with headquarters in Johannesburg, The 
 Transvaal. So much by way of preamble to 
 my story. 
 
 In 1914, when war w^as declared between 
 Germany and France, I was in Durban, Natal. 
 I had been there six days, having just returned 
 from a trip to Europe — my seventh, by the 
 w^ay — in which I had visited Germany and 
 England. All German subjects in Durban 
 were ordered to report to Dr. Speyer, the Ger- 
 man consul there. I reported with the rest, 
 
 1 
 
and 1 68 of us, all of military age, were ordered 
 to leave Durban on August 6 on the P. & O. 
 liner Borda, just in from Australia, and bound 
 for London via Capet ow^n. We w^ere to report 
 to the German consul in London, and he w^ould 
 forward us to Germany, a perfectly legal and 
 feasible arrangement, as at that time Great 
 Britain had not entered the war and it was not 
 expected that she would. So at least my 1 68 
 compatriots thought. 
 
 I knew better, for Dr. Speyer had taken me 
 into his confidence. German officials expected 
 war and were prepared for it. The 1 68, he 
 told me, would undoubtedly be interned in a 
 concentration camp somew^here en route, but 
 I, he hoped, could get through. In that hope, 
 he made me bearer of a sealed package of 
 documents which I was to deliver to a certain 
 person in London if I could, otherwise to de- 
 stroy. I was warned that their discovery on 
 my person vv^ould place me in a very serious 
 position, and told that I need not undertake the 
 mission unless I wished to. 
 
 I undertook it. Why? Not out of patriot- 
 ism. I did not love Germany or Germans. I 
 had been away too long, breathing another air. 
 I did love Englishmen. On my trips home, I 
 shortened my visits to my parents that I might 
 have as long a time as possible in England. 
 Germany bored me, and 1 was out of sym- 
 pathy wdth their ideals and customs. But I 
 loved adventure more than anything else. I 
 was eager to undertake the "stunt" of getting 
 myself and that packet through to its degtina- 
 
 ^ ©CI.A4:J72G9 
 
 ^M 17/9/6 
 
tion. I was eager, too, to see something of the 
 greatest war in history. I certainly did not 
 propose to languish in captivity till it was 
 over, and I knew that would certainly be my 
 lot eventually if I remained in South Africa. 
 Too many people there knew me as a German. 
 
 So I undertook the mission, and I too had 
 strong hopes that I could put it through. I had 
 been in South Africa so long that 1 beUeved 
 that among strangers I could pass myself off 
 as a South African, without nationaUty. My 
 English had the typical accent of the Boer. 
 And I dressed habitually in English fashion, 
 Scotch tweed riding clothes and cap, bamboo 
 cane, leather puttees and all the rest of it. And 
 I had my wits. 
 
 My opportunity to test them came very 
 soon. We were scarcely out of port when the 
 wireless gave us word that Great Britain had 
 declared war on Germany. There was high 
 excitement. The captain of the Borda had 
 received no specific orders, and knowing that 
 his German passengers could not escape, he 
 simply ordered the tables arranged so that 
 Germans were placed by themselves in the 
 dining saloon. The change was made in pub- 
 lic, the first morning out, as the passengers 
 entered the saloon for breakfast. The chief 
 steward politely asked each his nationality, 
 and the sheep were quickly parted from the 
 goats. 
 
 My only hope lay in carrying matters with 
 a high hand, and I took my place with the Brit- 
 ish passengers, none of whom knew I was a 
 
German. Posing as a born South African of 
 Boer descent I cultivated their acquaintance, 
 which was later to help me in the plans I was 
 already laying. 
 
 At Capetown, as I anticipated, ten British 
 soldiers, armed with loaded rifles, were wait- 
 ing on the dock, and only non-Germans were 
 allowed to land. But I, clad in my ultra-Eng- 
 lish togs, w^as not questioned when I marched 
 boldly down the gangplank with my new Eng- 
 lish friends and attached myself to a party of 
 tourists for a motor trip around Table Moun- 
 tain. 
 
 I knew^ Capetow^n w^ell, and once clear of 
 the ship set about solving my problem, w^hich 
 of course, vsras tw^ofold. I w^ished, if possible, to 
 escape detention and get on to London, w^hence 
 I hoped, by luck, still to be able to make my 
 w^ay to Germany. And I had, in any case, to 
 make sure the incriminating packet vv^as not 
 found on me in case I w^as subjected to arrest 
 and search. 
 
 In Capetow^n I had one friend. South Afri- 
 can manager for an insurance company, w^hom 
 I knew I could trust. Begging him to ask no 
 questions and seek no information w^hatso- 
 ever, I put my sealed packet into his care for 
 the day, to be destroyed intact in case 1 should 
 not ask for its return. I spent the afternoon 
 and evening w^ith him, and got him to return 
 to the ship w^ith me at midnight. 
 
 Just before w^e reached the pier I learned 
 that all my I 68 countrymen had been seized 
 and marched off, bag and baggage, to a deten- 
 
tion camp, and that the authorities, suspicious 
 of me, were awaiting my return. There was 
 nothing to do but walk straight aboard, where, 
 in the saloon, 1 found my luggage under the 
 guard of two Tommies. I blustered in with 
 what you Americans call bluff, and demanded 
 of the chief steward what such proceedings 
 meant. 
 
 'Tm sorry, sir," he said, "but all Germans 
 have been ordered to leave the ship, and these 
 soldiers were set to guard your luggage till you 
 w^ere found." 
 
 How 1 blustered over that insult! I, a South 
 African, a Boer who had fought and bled for 
 my country, to be called a German — to be 
 subjected to poHtical arrest in my own baili- 
 wick! I ordered my luggage put back in my 
 cabin at once. 
 
 The steward humbly referred me to the 
 captain, and leaving my friend to have a drink 
 in the saloon, I sought that functionary, whom 
 I found in his room chatting with the Cape- 
 town agent of the line. Once more I sounded 
 the whole gamut of righteous anger for their 
 benefit. 
 
 The captain listened very quietly, and when 
 I had finished put the question I had been ex- 
 pecting and preparing for all along. "If you 
 are a South African," he said, "how does it 
 happen that your ticket to London was bought 
 and paid for by the German consul at Dur- 
 ban?" 
 
 I was ready for him there. "Unforeseen 
 circumstances," I answered coolly. "The ship 
 
sailed before England and Germany were at 
 war. The German consul at Durban had 1 68 
 Germans to send to their fatherland by w^ay of 
 London — a proceeding perfectly legitimate at 
 that time. Most of them could not even speak 
 English, and he needed a man to see them 
 safely through. Because I w^as a traveler, be- 
 cause I spoke seven languages, including 
 English, Dutch and German, and because my 
 w^ork as head of a detective agency in Johan- 
 nesburg had made me w^ell known and trusted 
 in all that part of Africa, he selected me, and 
 part of my honorarium w^as my ticket. It w^as 
 a perfectly natural transaction then, but of 
 course now^ that England and Germany are at 
 w^ar I am put in a very disagreeable situation. 
 I think it's up to you to help me out of it." 
 
 Instantly the captain reached for his tele- 
 phone, w^hich had a shore connection, and rang 
 up the Capetown police! He told them who I 
 claimed to be, and asked them to send a man 
 to the Borda to identify me. You can imagine 
 the pins and needles 1 sat on till he came, for 
 I very well knew what would happen to me if 
 my story were not corroborated. But luck 
 vv^as vsrith me. In a short time a detective came 
 aboard, who recognized me at once. He w^as 
 able to say that he had know^n me for ten years, 
 and did not think I was a German. My friend, 
 the insurance manager, also confirmed my 
 statements, and there were apologies and a 
 friendly drink all round. 
 
 I retrieved my packet from my friend, and 
 the next morning at daylight sailed on the 
 
 6 
 
Borda, fully established as a reputable mem- 
 ber of the ship's little world, and sure of get- 
 ting through at least as far as London. As to 
 what might befall me there it did not seem 
 worth while to begin worrying yet. 
 
 There was an AustraHan parson aboard 
 who was very close to the captain, and I struck 
 up a friendship with him. In that way I 
 learned of a number of wireless messages, the 
 receipt of which was unknown to the passen- 
 gers in general. For instance, as we neared 
 the Canary Islands the captain was informed 
 that a German armed merchantman, the 
 Kaiser Wilhelm der Gross, had recently sunk 
 several British ships. 
 
 A little later he received another wireless, 
 purporting to come from a British man-of-war, 
 telling him he could safely put in for coal to 
 Las Palmas, in the Canaries. Instead, the 
 canny officer immediately laid a course in the 
 opposite direction, and his judgment was vin- 
 dicated a few hours later when a British 
 cruiser steamed alongside and gave us orders 
 to keep clear of Las Palmas, as two British 
 ships had just been sunk in the vicinity. The 
 first message had been simply a decoy from 
 the Kaiser Wilhelm. 
 
 The rest of the voyage was uneventful, and 
 the day after the naval battle off HeUgoland 
 we steamed into the Thames and at Tillbury 
 Docks were halted by a torpedo boat with 
 orders that all non-British passengers should 
 be sent ashore. 
 
 The order put me in a serious predicament. 
 
because of my precious and deadly package of 
 documents. I had but a minute for decision, 
 and in that time slipped down to my cabin, put 
 the packet into a weighted container I had 
 already prepared for it, and chucked it out of 
 the porthole into the secret recesses of the 
 river. I w^as determined, if I erred at all, to err 
 on the safe side. 
 
 As it turned out, I had erred. We foreigners 
 — myself and half a dozen others, Russian, 
 French and Belgian — were merely set ashore 
 because the government w^as permitting no 
 foreigners to sail up to London through the 
 mine fields in the Thames. Neither our per- 
 sons or our luggage w^ere subjected to an ex- 
 amination, and w^ithin an hour we w^ere going 
 on to London by train. , .,. ...x -v^ ^ & ..■>, . ..^ ■■—. <^ 
 
 I took rooms, as 1 often had before, at the 
 Bedford Hotel in Southampton Row. My 
 next problem was to get passage to Holland, 
 and I could think of no one more likely to help 
 me in that than Mr. Harold Irvine, the young 
 mining magnate, who had been a particularly 
 close friend of mine in South Africa. I tele- 
 phoned him at once, and when he told me to 
 call at his office the next morning, Wednesday, 
 I felt my difficulties w^ere at an end. 
 
 Promptly on the hour of my appointment I 
 called at Irvine's office, wearing the tweed rid- 
 ing togs I always affected. Between one 
 legging and the calf of my leg were hidden my 
 German military papers and the passport 
 issued to me by the consul at Durban, while 
 
my coat pockets were stuffed with harmless 
 personal papers. 
 
 I was asked to wait for a little, and was 
 ushered into the luxuriously appointed direct- 
 ors' room. You w^ill remember that I had been 
 in Natal only six days when war was declared, 
 and had just returned from Europe then. 
 Irvine was one of the last men I had seen before 
 I left London, and as I sat waiting for him to 
 receive me I pictured to myself his surprise at 
 seeing me back so soon. 
 
 The door to his office opened suddenly. 
 Instead of looking into the smiilng face of my 
 friend I found myself confronting tw^o stran- 
 gers w^hom I, as a detective, instantly recog- 
 nized as brothers in the craft. 
 
 One of them held out his hand to me. "Wie 
 gehts? ' he asked. 
 
 It w^as hard to keep from smiling at the 
 transparency of the trap. But I merely told 
 him I did not understand. 
 
 "Come, come, ' said the other, also in Ger- 
 man, "you certainly speak German. " 
 
 "I don't knowr w^hat you are saying," I told 
 him, too, in English, and the pair vsrere obliged 
 to use that language before I vs^ould talk. Then 
 I quickly learned vs^hat had happened. At that 
 time any person w^ho entertained or received 
 in his home or place of business any German 
 or Austrian subject w^ithout making a report 
 to the police w^as liable to arrest and fine. 
 Irvine, know^ing how^ recently I had been in 
 London, could not believe I had returned to 
 South Africa at all. Believing I had been in 
 
 9 
 
Germany and had returned to England as a 
 spy, he had reported my arrival to Scotland 
 Yard. 
 
 To the Scotland Yard men I repeated the 
 same story I had told the captain of the 
 Borda, and in proof that I had just come from 
 South Africa showed the stub of my ticket. 
 One of the detectives left the room then, and, 
 w^hile the other questioned me, confirmed my 
 story at the office of the P. & O. line. But 
 they vv^ere still suspicious. 
 
 "What are you going to do now^? " one of 
 them asked. I said 1 w^anted to go to France 
 and join the British colors. 
 
 "But Mr. Irvine tells us you w^ant to go to 
 Holland," the other put in promptly. "Why 
 Holland, if you vs^ant to go to France?" 
 
 1 had my story ready, and explained that 
 some of my relatives had been in Germany 
 when the w^ar broke out. They had been sent 
 to Holland, and I w^anted to see them safely 
 into England before I joined the army. 
 
 It w^as not a brilliant creation. But in the 
 absence of any proof that I was a German — I 
 could fairly feel that military passport burning 
 me inside my legging! — and in the presence of 
 the papers w^hich amply corroborated the 
 statements about my business in Jonhannes- 
 burg, it held w^ater up to a certain extent. 
 They became outw^ardly friendly and said that 
 I might go, but must not attempt to leave Lon- 
 don till a cable from South Africa confirmed 
 everything. 
 
 Such a cable w^as the very last thing I 
 
 10 
 
wanted. It would prove my German citizen- 
 ship beyond a doubt. Also, I knew that I 
 w^ould be watched every moment I w^as in the 
 city. My only hope was to elude the police 
 before they wrere fairly on my trail. And any 
 blunder on my part meant the detention 
 camp. 
 
 So instead of returning to my hotel, where 
 I very well knewr a detective w^as also ready 
 w^aiting for me, secure in the fact that I must 
 come there for my luggage, I w^ent direct to 
 Cook's office and booked passage to Rotter- 
 dam on the Batavia IV, sailing that afternoon. 
 I would not risk discovery by telephoning the 
 hotel to have my luggage sent to the ship. I 
 abandoned everything I had, and I suppose 
 that the detectives later had the satisfaction of 
 rummaging through my effects in a fruitless 
 quest for enlightenment. 
 
 The Batavia sailed from Tillbury Docks — 
 w^here the Borda had landed me, you remem- 
 ber — and there I ran into still more trouble. 
 Instead of boarding the ship from a pier the 
 passengers w^ere put on a small tug in charge 
 of government officers. We vv^ere counted as 
 w^e w^ent on board, and w^ere told to remain on 
 the upper deck until called elsew^here. Then 
 the tug steamed out to midstream and an- 
 chored. "Passengers w^ill go to the deck be- 
 low^ and have their passports examined," the 
 order w^as passed. 
 
 The passengers began to move belowr, and 
 believing boldness to be the only course I made 
 myself one of the first half dozen. But v^hen 
 
 11 
 
I saw the ordeal I must face I really believed 
 that the game was up with me at last. We had to 
 go one by one down a narrow stair, at the foot 
 of which was a table. At the table sat an elderly 
 officer in the uniform of the Dutch immigra- 
 tion service, flanked by two subordinates, 
 while at either end stood an English detective. 
 Escape seemed impossible. 
 
 One by one the passengers in front of me 
 presented their passports, answered questions 
 acceptably, and w^ere permitted to pass on into 
 the forward cabin of the tug. It came my turn : 
 I said I had no passport. They asked me why. 
 I told the same old story. I was a South Afri- 
 can, 1 had no nationality, and I had started on 
 my voyage before the w^ar broke out. I w^as a 
 helpless victim of circumstances. 
 
 And luck w^as vvrith me — such luck as I 
 w^ould never have dared to hope for. That old 
 Dutch officer had fought in the Boer w^ar. He 
 knew^ the Transvaal w^ell, vv^hich gave him con- 
 fidence that he could trip me if I w^as telling any 
 lie. He questioned me in detail, asking for 
 information w^hich could only be know^n to one 
 vv^ho had been there. 1 answ^ered all his ques- 
 tions so clearly that he told the British officers 
 it w^as plain 1 w^as telling the truth. He over- 
 rode all their objections about the irregularity 
 of my papers, and I w^as passed on board the 
 Batavia IV w^ith the other passengers, w^ho 
 vs^ere once more counted to make sure there 
 had been no stowaw^ays on the tugs. 
 
 So I was through the lines at last, for of 
 course the rest was easy. At Rotterdam, next 
 
 12 
 
morning, 1 was the last man to leave the ship. 
 Passports were again examined there, but 
 this time I had one! I drew my German papers 
 from my legging and showed them to the ex- 
 amining Dutch officer. In neutral Holland a 
 German passport had the same vaUdity as a 
 British one. The officer stared in amazement 
 to see such papers presented by a passenger 
 from England, then understood, laughed, and 
 congratulated me on my feat. 
 
 Free at last, 1 reported to the German consul 
 in Rotterdam. He ordered me to proceed at once 
 to Wesel, a German fortress on the Dutch fron- 
 tier. At the border a naval officer met me with 
 a motor car and escorted me into Wesel. And 
 then something very disagreeable became 
 plain to me. After all the risks 1 had taken to 
 join my country's colors, 1 was being taken 
 into Germany a prisoner. 1 was not permitted 
 to speak to any one, and was taken directly 
 into the fortress. I was evidently under grave 
 suspicion. The reason for it soon became ap- 
 parent. 
 
 i;i 
 
My reception in the German fortress town 
 of Wesel, on the Dutch frontier, was part of a 
 comedy of errors w^hich I found it difficult to 
 laugh at at the time. I soon found that I w^as 
 under as grave suspicion in Germany as ever 
 I had been under in England. That rather 
 netteld me, after all the risks I had taken and 
 all the hardships I had endured to get back 
 into the country. But the reason w^as plain 
 enough, and natural enough, too, I must admit. 
 My story w^as too good to be true. The au- 
 thorities could not believe any German could 
 have come, as I claimed to, from Natal to Lon- 
 don on a British ship, and then again to Hol- 
 land. They thought I must in reality be a 
 British spy v^hose "escape" from England had 
 been carefully arranged. Even my passport 
 issued by the consul at Durban was regarded 
 as an extremely successful forgery. 
 
 Luckily for me, I had brothers in Germany 
 v^hose standing w^as above suspicion, one 
 being a prominent advocate and one an acting 
 officer of the army. They established my 
 identity, but this required tw^o days, during 
 w^hich time I w^as not allow^ed to w^alk outdoors 
 except in company with an officer. But once 
 my brothers had confirmed my story the mer- 
 cury in the thermometer of my popularity shot 
 up as high as it had previously been lov/. 1 
 
 14 
 
was made the lion of Wesel — a happening 
 which confirmed an impression I had long 
 since formed of the German mind, both mili- 
 tary and civil. It was a small mind, without a 
 very w^ide horizon. Trifles can be miraculous 
 to it, providing they are novel trifles. Africa 
 is a very long w^ay off, to Wesel. Wesel had 
 never heard before of a German w^ho came all 
 the way from Africa. So, to its people I w^as a 
 startling curiosity. They pointed me out to 
 each other in the cafes as **der Afrikander,'* 
 and were surprised at the color of my skin. 
 Hiey had heard Africans w^ere black men. 
 
 Among other proofs of confidence and ad- 
 miration, I w^as offered a place in the German 
 secret service. This w^as really flattering, for 
 such positions are by no means easy to obtain. 
 But I declined it. I had not come all that dis- 
 tance to play the spy in Amsterdam or Rotter- 
 dam. I vs^anted to see something of the w^ar. 
 
 And I found means to obtain my vs^ishes. I 
 had brought a good deal of information with 
 me. I had, for instance, by copying day by 
 day the Borda's noon positions as they vs^ere 
 posted on the bulletin board, established the 
 new route follow^ed by British merchantmen 
 bound from Capetow^n to London. I had ob- 
 served conditions in London, and had first- 
 hand information of the "control " exercised 
 over travelers entering and leaving England. 
 All this w^as considered valuable, and because 
 I had brought it, because I w^as considered to 
 have shown a good deal of cleverness in my 
 various escapes, and, also, I suppose, because 
 
 15 
 
I was a detective and spoke many languages, 
 I got that offer to enter the secret service. 
 
 "No," I said, "I w^ant to be in the fighting. 
 If I have done anything you consider v^orthy 
 of reward, let me say what the reward shall 
 be. Accept me as a volunteer, and assign me 
 to the regiment w^hich is closest to the enemy 
 on the w^estern front." 
 
 You v^ill be surprised, perhaps, to learn 
 that there can be any volunteers in a conscript 
 army like the German. Strictly speaking, 
 there cannot be. 
 
 But volunteer is the nearest English equiva- 
 lent for Kriegsfreiw^illiger. By meeting certain 
 educational qualifications you used to be able 
 — in times of peace — to postpone doing your 
 four 3^ears in the army. Then if, in time of vs^ar, 
 you come back of your ow^n accord to serve 
 w^ith the colors, you are a Kriegsfreiw^illiger, 
 v^hich carries certain privileges w^ith it. 
 Among other things, you can hope to become 
 an officer if you have the grade qualifications. 
 
 So when Captain von Hahnke, in charge of 
 the secret service bureau at Wesel, found I was 
 unwilling to accept a place in his department, 
 he took the necessary steps to aid me in my 
 ambition of joining a regiment. "But if you 
 are w^ounded or incapacitated for field service 
 through sickness," he told me, "report back to 
 me and I wrill take care of you in the secret 
 service." 
 
 After a short period of training at a base 
 camp I w^as appointed to the tenth company of 
 the Fifty-seventh Infantry Regiment, and sent 
 
 16 
 
to France. That was in October, 1914. The 
 regiment was lying in the first Hne trenches 
 about Aubers and La Bassee canal, and my 
 ambition to have a part in the actual fighting in 
 this greatest of all w^ars w^as soon amply grati- 
 fied, for as a volunteer and "the African" — 
 my story had lost nothing of its glamor for 
 these untraveled Germans and the title still 
 clung to me — 1 v/as given a post of honor. I 
 was made one of the regimental couriers — the 
 men who transmit the orders of the command- 
 ing officers to the under officers immediately 
 with the troops. Such duty is perilous and 
 often highly responsible. 
 
 Enough has been written already about the 
 conditions of trench life and warfare, and I do 
 not propose to bore you by writing more. One 
 grows habituated to what at first seem its 
 horrors and its terrors — the intermittent rain 
 of missiles and explosives, the mud, the wet, 
 the crude food and all the rest — as one can 
 apparently become habituated to anything 
 under the sun. One incident, however, I must 
 tell you. About a hundred of us recruits had 
 been drafted out from the base camp in a body, 
 and just behind the first line trenches were 
 drawn up for distribution to our various com- 
 panies and regiments. As we stood there, in 
 a field behind some strawstacks, a single Eng- 
 lish shell fell in the midst of us and exploded. 
 Instantly the hundred of us vanished. The 
 one man left in sight was a much-disgusted 
 officer who called to us to fall in. What to 
 him was an ordinary part of the day's work 
 
 17 
 
was to our unaccustomed nerves a cataclysm. 
 We were all prone in the mud and grass. It 
 was not that we were afraid. There was no 
 question of bravery or cowardice, only a ques- 
 tion of nerves. One week later they were 
 grenade-proof. 
 
 We had the British and the Indian troops in 
 the sector of trenches opposed to our, and the 
 trenches themselves had principally — water! 
 It came up to our waists, and as the watches 
 were arranged we made the best of it for 
 twenty-four hours, when we were relieved by 
 the other half of the regiment and "rested" for 
 a day ourselves. 
 
 To call that interim a rest time still strikes 
 me as a grim joke. There is far more rest in 
 the trenches. To begin with, your officers 
 bother you little there. The traditional Prus- 
 sian martinet, as far as regards company 
 officers and commanders, and even battalion 
 commanders, has largely vanished, death and 
 promotion in the early days of the war having 
 accounted for most of the names on the active 
 list. To replace the missing in their minor 
 commands reserve officers have been called to 
 duty, and since most of these have lived many 
 years in civil life, they still reflect the civilian 
 point of view. Also, in the trenches, one can 
 have one's fill of sleep. There is nothing 
 much else to do there. The smallest subdivi- 
 sion of a company is a group of eight men, and 
 of these only two need be on watch at a time. 
 But in reserve, five miles behind the 
 trenches, you get little chance to sleep. For 
 
 18 
 
whatever has become of the old-time Prussian 
 officer, the old-time Prussian sergeant still 
 blooms there in all his glory, and it is on your 
 sergeant, let me tell you, that most of your 
 comfort depends. 
 
 For the rank and file, then, "rest time*' 
 means a continuous session with the sergeant. 
 There are boots to be cleaned, uniforms to be 
 scoured of the trench mud, rifles to be cleaned 
 and oiled, baths to be taken, something to fill 
 every hour of daylight. For me, however, 
 those hours meant comparative freedom. As 
 a Kriegsfreiwilliger, a courier and an "Afir- 
 can" I tacitly took it for granted that I was free 
 of small domestic obligations, and for some 
 reason or other I was permitted to get away 
 with it. I spent my vacations from the 
 trenches making small patrols which, if they 
 earned me no glory, made me immensely 
 popular with the officers of the headquarters 
 to which I was attached as courier. 
 
 I did not like the military food. The day we 
 were in reserve it meant black coffee and a 
 slice of poor rye bread for breakfast, a ladle 
 of hot soup — made of vegetables, potatoes, 
 barley and a modicum of wheat — with bread 
 at noon; for supper more bread and coffee. 
 That day, too, was served out to each man a 
 bit of cheese or sausage or bacon, with more 
 bread, which was destined to be his lunch in 
 the trench next day. 
 
 In the trenches the day began at 5.30 with 
 black coffee, brought up in buckets four or 
 five miles from the field kitchen. At noon the 
 
 19 
 
men devised what lunch they could, eating 
 their cold snack or doing extremely primitive 
 cooking in the dugouts. Potatoes saute with 
 onions from the deserted fields about was a 
 trench specialty. For supper of trench days, 
 nothing at all was provided. 
 
 Such food did not appeal to me. As a mat- 
 ter of fact, it is not a proper ration, and men 
 who have nothing else to eat eventually come 
 down with digestive troubles. Hence my 
 
 "patrols." 
 
 Combining the experience gained as a de- 
 tective and a free ranger of the veldt 1 thor- 
 oughly explored the country in our rear. 
 Chickens, eggs, butter, milk and wine were 
 my unmilitant objective, and 1 may add that 
 my operations were highly successful. No 
 other headquarters mess on that whole front 
 lived in such fields of clover as mine did. I 
 must add, once more, that the French peasants 
 did not suffer from my canipaign. There was 
 no looting. Everything I took was paid for 
 on the spot, in good money and at full price. 
 "The African" became a French institution, 
 
 too. 
 
 But those pleasant days — I really call them 
 pleasant, looking back — were not to last. 
 Along in December, at the time of the first 
 snows, the exposure and the constant soaking 
 proved too much for me. I came down with 
 the fever and was sent to the hopistal at La 
 Bassee, a very sick man, barely able to move, 
 Once more it looked as if the jig were up. 
 
 I chafed particularly under the conditions, 
 
 20 
 
because as the time drew on toward Christ- 
 mas the air was full of rumors of great things 
 soon to come. Apparently if I was ever to see 
 fighting of the first magnitude I must see it 
 then. So on December 20 I took French leave 
 of the hospital and hobbled out to the front. 
 The major, mindful of the eggs, butter and 
 wine he owned to me, let me stay, and so, by 
 luck, I was able to be present at one of the 
 hottest actions of the whole war, that great 
 storming and capture of the British first line 
 trenches at La Bassee, which took place De- 
 cember 20 and 2 1 , 1 9 1 4, one of the many occa- 
 sions on which that bloodstained wrinkle in 
 the earth known as the International Trench 
 at La Bassee was captured by one party 
 or other. It lies in a hollow, is flooded 
 with water and is attackabel from all di- 
 rections. During one period of twenty days 
 it was held successively by the troops of three 
 different nations. 
 
 We attacked at 8 a. m., after a night of 
 preparation by the artillery, and I must admit 
 at once that my part was purely ornamental, 
 and not very decorative at that. One night in 
 the flooded trenches had brought my fever all 
 back. However, I was there, and when the 
 charge was sounded managed to scramble and 
 roll out of our trench onto the long-desired 
 strip of No Man's Land, and hobbled about 
 there, using my rifle as a crutch, until the 
 enemy had been obliged to run back along his 
 traverses to his second line. Then outraged 
 Nature rebeled and struck me motionless. I 
 
 21 
 
could not move a single muscle. Even my 
 tongue and lips w^ere stiff. 
 
 The stretcher bearers took me back to the 
 field hospital at La Bassee; from there, with 
 the next batch of sick and wounded, I was re- 
 moved further to the rear — in a springless farm 
 cart which I still remember with no feeling of 
 affection — to the hospital at Marquilles. Fol- 
 lowed spells of hospital at Carvin, Dunn, 
 Douai, and finally Nurnberg, where for the 
 first time w^e came under the care of w^omen 
 as nurses. Finally, at the beginning of April, 
 1915, I w^as pronounced convalescent and sent 
 to the regimental base hospital of the Fifty- 
 seventh, at the same fortress of Wesel, wrhere 
 I had first entered Germany, and to w^hich, you 
 may remember, Captain von Hahnke, in 
 charge of the secret service bureau there, had 
 invited me to report in case anything led me 
 to reconsider my determination not to enter 
 his branch of the service. 
 
 Once more I find myself compelled to speak 
 of food. Theoretically, the food supply of 
 German military hospitals is excellent. The 
 doctors order w^ithout stinting special diet for 
 any patient w^ho needs it, and special diet 
 comprises such delicacies as eggs, ham, butter, 
 cocoa and fresh milk. The orders are given in 
 all good faith, but in my experience are not 
 aWays carried out. There seems to be a fair 
 supply of such special provisions, but they 
 sometimes fail to reach their intended goal. 
 If you w^onder w^hy, ask the hospital cooks and 
 orderlies. I have seen them frying up four 
 
 22 
 
eggs apiece for their own use. And 1 have 
 knowledge of their selling hospital food sup- 
 plies to French villagers who had money to 
 tempt them. 
 
 Wesel, as a fortress, is comparatively insig- 
 nificant, but from a secret service point of 
 view it is at present one of the most important 
 places in all Germany. Of course the brain 
 of the espionage system is still in the Wilhelm- 
 strasse, as it has always been. But the diffi- 
 culty of getting into or out of Germany under 
 war conditions makes it necessary to have an 
 outside "clearing house" through which the 
 information coming from foreign countries 
 can be transmitted to Germany. Holland 
 meet this need admirably, and the connecting 
 link between Holland and Berlin is Wesel. It 
 is espionage headquarters for the whole west- 
 ern front. 
 
 When I reached Wesel 1 found that Captain 
 von Hahnke had been succeeded in command 
 by Captain-Lieutenant Freyer of the Imperial 
 Navy. But the story of "the African" was 
 still remembered, and Captain Freyer at once 
 offered me a position in Rotterdam. I was still 
 in bad head health, but as the work was to be 
 indoors I accepted the offer and went on to 
 Rotterdam, not a little curious to see the actual 
 workings of the service of which the world has 
 heard so much. 
 
 The chief of the German secret service in 
 Holland, I had been told, was Captain Vollard, 
 a German navy officer, whose falsified pass- 
 port — without which he could not remain in 
 
 23 
 
The Netherlands — represents him to be the 
 manager of a big German newspaper, * 'Ham- 
 burger Freinderblatt." He Uves in the Claacs 
 de Vrieselaam, in Rotterdam, and I drove past 
 the number given me — an unpretentious 
 house — dismissed my taxi a f evv^ blocks further 
 on, and walked back to present myself. 
 
 At the door of the house a little girl, not 
 more than fourteen years old, w^as standing. 
 
 **Are you Herr ?" she asked as I came up. 
 
 Very much surprised, I ansv^^ered that I was. 
 
 "Come in," said the little girl. "Captain 
 Vollard is expecting you," and I w^as shovs^n 
 into a big v^aiting room from vvrhich a number 
 of doors led into other apartments. All these 
 doors, and all the doors I had passed on the 
 w^ay upstairs w^ere closed, but presently one 
 of them opened and I was show^n into Captain 
 Vollard's office. With him w^ere several offi- 
 cers I had met before and knew^ to be in the 
 secret service under Freyer. Greetings were 
 exchanged and then Captain Vollard and 1 
 w^ere left alone. I should add, perhaps, that at 
 Wesel I had retrieved my English togs and 
 w^as w^earing them once more. 
 
 It w^as decided that I should go to w^ork that 
 afternoon, and w^hile vv^e w^ere arranging de- 
 tails the telephone bell jingled. Vollard 
 reached for the instrument, and from his con- 
 versation I v/as astounded to learn that he w^as 
 talking to Captain Freyer's office in Wesel. 
 The border w^as closed, and there w^as sup- 
 posedly no telephone connection betw^een Ger- 
 many and Holland. 
 
 24 
 
Captain Vollard noticed my surprise, and 
 when he had finished talking turned to me. 
 *'That," he said, "is one of the secrets -with 
 which you are now entrusted. This line is 
 the only one betw^een Holland and Germany. 
 So far as the public know^s it does not exist. 
 You will have to do a lot of telephoning over 
 it w^hile you are attached to this office, for all 
 the information 1 gather here goes to Captain 
 Freyer over this telephone, except what is 
 sent on by special courier." 
 
 As w^e talked a young w^oman in the early 
 tw^enties was reading notes from a number of 
 slips of paper to Freyer' s office over the tele- 
 phone. This office is the leak by w^hich all 
 secret service information coming into Hol- 
 land dribbles into Germany. Captain Vollard 
 himself speaks several languages, and every 
 day reads through the Dutch, French and 
 English papers, checking off the passages 
 w^hich he wishes to have relayed. Tvv^o young 
 w^omen translate them and send them on to 
 Wesel in the manner I have just described. 
 
 The Captain also has runners out w^ho 
 watch the new^spaper bulletins for cable new^s 
 or other information. The moment anything 
 important is announced, one of these runners 
 jumps into a cab and hurries to Vollard's 
 home. Other runners frequent the cafes and 
 business districts, vs^here they pick up any in- 
 formation they can. 
 
 Most French and Belgian spies gather in 
 Poll's Cafe, Rotterdam, w^hile the German 
 spies rather favor the Cafe Sw^iss. These men, 
 
 25 
 
who might be called the rank and file of the 
 espionage system, for the most part know 
 each other, but do not know the heads of their 
 departments nor the men and women who are 
 doing the special work. They know the men 
 to whom they report, but that is about all, the 
 social line being drawn quite as sharply here 
 as in the army. The runners associate with 
 each other and their superiors keep to them- 
 selves. 
 
 Runners also watch the steamship piers 
 and report to Vollard's office everything that 
 goes into a vessel bound for Great Britain or 
 France. If there is a consignment of copper, 
 for instance, put aboard a ship, the fact is im- 
 mediately transmitted to Wesel and from there 
 to Berlin. Does such information seem a com- 
 paratively insignificant result to obtain from 
 the use of all this complicated machinery? 
 Then just remember for a moment how^ strenu- 
 ously from the outset Germany has objected to 
 the British blockade of her ports and insisted 
 on her right to retaliate by destroying enemy 
 shipping w^ith her submarines, and you w^ill 
 begin to understand how^ important to her the 
 espionage system is and w^hy the administra- 
 tion of it has been put almost w^holly into the 
 hands of naval officers, who have replaced the 
 army men detailed for such work before the 
 vv^ar. I believe it is no exaggeration to say that 
 . if Germany had not had the maritime informa- 
 tion she has received through Holland, she 
 would already be hopelessly beaten. 
 
 All spies coming from a foreign country 
 
 26 
 
into Rotterdam report first to Captain Vol- 
 lard's subordinate, Dr. Brant, who is immedi- 
 ately in control of all the foreign spies. Most 
 of Brant's spies work through commercial 
 houses. There are men going into France and 
 a few into England even, as travelers for 
 houses with whom the British or French have 
 done business for fifty or sixty years. Yet 
 they are spies, though almost always the firms 
 for which they work are ignorant of that phase 
 of their activities. Such spies have been in 
 the employ of Germany for many years. Long 
 ;ago the Wilhelmstrasse foresaw that when 
 v^ar actually came espionage work would have 
 to be done through neutral countries, and ac- 
 cordingly enlisted the service of men reputably 
 known in the various foreign capitals and 
 ports. 
 
 My work in Captain Vollard's office w^as 
 the translation and forwarding of papers, mes- 
 sages and information. It was not very excit- 
 ing, but I seemed to be getting on with it well 
 enough, when suddenly the South African in 
 me broke out, and got me into what later 
 promised to be serious trouble. 
 
 The original occasion of it w^as simple 
 enough. I w^as suddenly ordered to carry 
 some dispatches into Wesel. My health was 
 still wretched, and I had been promised, you 
 remember, that my w^ork w^ould be w^holly in 
 the office. So I demurred, and when the mat- 
 ter w^as pressed, flatly refused to go. That is 
 w^hat 1 meant by the South African in me 
 breaking out. Insubordination, to a German 
 
 27 
 
bred as well as born there, would be inconceiv- 
 able. But I not only found it conceivable: I 
 rather enjoyed it. 
 
 Hot words passed between Captain Vollard 
 and myself. I did not go to Wesel, but we 
 were never friends after that, and a fortnight 
 later I was recalled to Wesel. That \\ras my 
 only punishment; not a very harsh one for 
 such insubordination as mine had been. But 
 as a matter of fact I believe that I was under 
 suspicion, and that my superiors, instead of 
 imprisoning me, preferred to leave me free in 
 order that they might "get something on me." 
 
 My reception at Wesel convinced me that I 
 was thoroughly in disfavor, if not in disgrace. 
 Without ceremony I was ushered into the pres- 
 ence of Captain Freyer, who scowled blackly 
 at me. " ," he said, without formal greet- 
 ing, "it is the custom of the government to 
 imprison until the end of the war any member 
 of the secret service who returns from a neutral 
 country after having had the slightest trouble 
 with his superiors. Those returning from 
 enemy countries call for a still severer treat- 
 ment. Your case seems to be somewhat a 
 special one, and I am going to give you one 
 more chance, at the risk of departing from 
 the rules of discipline. I think you can still be 
 of use. You say you are sick. All right, for 
 the present I am going to send you to join the 
 sick company of your regiment at Emmerich. 
 That is all." 
 
 So to Emmerich I went, the South African 
 in me more anti-Prussianized than ever. I had 
 
 28 
 
gone through a good deal for Germany, of my 
 own free will. I did not seem to be gettmg 
 very many thanks. Also, I reaUzed that 1 
 stood in some danger. It is much more un- 
 healthy to fall under the displeasure of the 
 German miUtary authorities than it is in Great 
 Britain. The Germans "use powder" freely. 
 
 29 
 
I was ordered to the wounded company of 
 my regiment. You understand just what 
 that means. Since the war began German 
 regiments — there are four companies of a war 
 strength of 400 men each to a battahon and 
 three battalions to a regiment — are made up of 
 two sorts of companies, war companies at the 
 rear and recruit companies at the front. No man 
 can join a wounded company till after service 
 at the front. 
 
 To such companies many small favors are 
 granted, and from a German point of view life 
 in them is comparatively easy. Here is the 
 schedule of a day: Five a. m., reveille; 5.20, 
 assembly for black coffee and black bread; 
 6 a. m. to I 1.30 a. m., drill in full marching 
 equipment; then till 2.30, dinner and rest; 
 2.30 p. m. till 5.30 p. m., more drill, baths, 
 tramps, etc.; 5.30 till 6.45, clean rifles and 
 equipment; 7 p. m., supper, and then freedom 
 till (when taps calls for lights out). If that is 
 easy, you can imagine what active life in a 
 recruit company means. 
 
 Every Monday the wounded company is 
 subjected to medical examination, and all 
 members of it who can be returned either to 
 "garrison duty," which means sentry-go about 
 ammunition depots and the like, or to full duty, 
 which means to return to the trenches. That 
 
 30 
 
return is not made in a body, but the old hands 
 are distributed among the recruit companies 
 of each new transport, to exercise a steadying 
 effect on the raw material until it finds itself. 
 Despite the rigid weeding-out to which they 
 are constantly subjected, the wounded com- 
 panies tend to grow in size as the war goes on. 
 Some of them now contain six hundred men, 
 while the companies in the trenches, despite 
 constant recruiting, are reduced to one hun- 
 dred and fifty and even less men. 
 
 The recruits go to the front with compara- 
 tive cheerfulness still. Not so the veterans. 
 You have only to watch for a littel the eager- 
 ness with which men strive to be retained in a 
 wounded company to realize that however 
 high the command may feel the German sol- 
 dier who knows what it is from experience has 
 had his fill of war. 
 
 Emmerich is a town and fortress on the Dutch 
 frontier of German. I went there under escort 
 and joined the wounded company of the Fifty- 
 seventh, which was assigned to duty there as 
 a border guard. Again I had the dehghtful 
 feeling that I was only given seeming liberty 
 in the hope that I might trip myself. Indeed, 
 I was informed by an aide of Captain Freyer 
 that a single slip on my part would mean im- 
 prisonment until the end of the war, and per- 
 haps w^orse. 
 
 I also learned it was suspected that I had 
 been in communication with the British consul 
 while I was in Rotterdam — a pleasant bit of 
 new^s. 
 
 31 
 
Before I had been in Emmerich Ions mv ill- 
 nessagam became acute. The local police had 
 orders to arrest me if 1 attempted to leave the 
 town. My mail was under surveillance. I 
 could not even talk with a civilian without 
 bemg closely watched, and 1 presume every 
 word I said was noted. ^ 
 
 So a disagreeable summer passed. The mid- 
 dle of November, 1915, I took over duty at 
 tmmench and was put in charge of a telephone 
 station on the mam road from the Dutch fron- 
 tier Along It great quantities of supplies were 
 continually passing from Holland into Ger! 
 many. Much of the material was smuggled 
 m. At least the Dutch officials mustfave 
 wmked at its passage. Hundreds of horses 
 went by my station every morning with truck 
 loads of iron, brass and copper a^nd tanks of 
 oil. Of course all the soldiers along the line 
 were required td aid in the passage of h"s 
 material. I made it my business !o mingle 
 
 ^nd th^r ^""^ '"'*7!,'^ '^^'^ acquaintance, 
 and they soon regarded me as a fixture there 
 one of themselves. My purpose in so doing 
 you have probably guessed already. ^ 
 
 anlriif^'T^'^'y T'^ °^ '^^ ^«™^" army 
 
 X kk 1 u ^"'^ "^^y^- ' ^a« continually treated 
 
 shabbily by my superiors, and well knew that 
 
 was under grave suspicion. It seemed to me 
 
 see to It that I was imprisoned, if not worse 
 Furthermore, as I have said, I was alwayrmore 
 British than anything else, at heart. Getting 
 mto Germany and seeing some fighting had 
 
been an amusing adventure. But now it had 
 ceased to be amusing and I had quite enough 
 of it. I wanted to get out. The question was, 
 how could it be done. I thought I saw a way. 
 
 In my company there was an oil merchant 
 frorn Duesberg, who frequently assisted in 
 passing along consignments of oil, in some of 
 which he had a personal interest. I made a 
 friend of him, and was seen much in his com- 
 pany, often helping him to get the stuff over 
 the border. 
 
 One night I took advantage of this fact. I 
 borrowed a bicycle and wandered out among 
 the outposts inquiring for a consignment of 
 oil which I said was about to be smuggled into 
 Germany. None of them had heard of it as 
 yet, and with the excuse I kept continually 
 working toward the outskirts of our lines until 
 I was on a road one side of which was Holland 
 and the other Germany. About 8 p. m. I in- 
 quired at an outpost for the mythical oil. The 
 men there knew nothing about it, and friendly 
 suggested that I go on to the next post, a quar- 
 ter of a mile away. I went — and once I was 
 out of sight I steered across the road into Hol- 
 land, dropped my bicycle among some bushes 
 and went up a side lane to a farmhouse where 
 a dim light showed. 
 
 A Hollander was living there with his wife, 
 who was a Belgian. I was in uniform, and the 
 farmer asked me if I wished to buy supplies. 
 I said I had come to stay, and just then a girl 
 came in to buy some milk. She heard me ask- 
 ing the farmer where I could buy some civilian 
 
 33 
 
clothes which would fit me, and informed me 
 that she lived nearby and had a brother about 
 my size who would undoubtedly sell me 
 clothes. I went home with her and paid the 
 brother 50 gulden, about $25, for a greasy old 
 peasant's suit and a night's lodging. It was 
 the last money I had, with the exception of two 
 marks, which went next day to buy a tie and 
 collar from the local schoolmaster. 
 
 I changed into civilian attire, wrapped my 
 discarded uniform in a bundle, crept down to 
 the border and tossed it over to Germany. 
 Then I went back to the farmhouse and had 
 been there half an hour when the door opened 
 and in stalked two Dutch soldiers accom- 
 panied by a German saloonkeeper whom I 
 knew^. 
 
 The soldiers asked me who and what I was. 
 As I spoke Dutch, I told them I was a Hol- 
 lander. But the saloonkeeper interrupted me 
 continually. ^ "He is no Hollander," he kept 
 on saying. "I know him well. He is a Ger- 
 man and he has deserted from the army. You 
 must arrest him. That is the law." 
 
 **I am of Dutch descent," 1 insisted. "1 am 
 a South African. My home is in the Trans- 
 vaal, and I wish to return there. You have no 
 right to stop me. If I was a deserter, where is 
 my uniform? If I had come to Holland in the 
 uniform of a German soldier, then you could 
 arrest me. But as it is, I have as much right 
 to be here as you have." 
 
 The soldiers were afraid to take a chance, 
 and I was escorted to the local military head- 
 
 34 
 
quarters and locked up there for the night. Next 
 day the Dutch commandant examined me, and 
 representatives of the authorities at Emmerich 
 appeared, asking to have me returned to them. 
 The commandant vv^as in a quandary. A straw 
 vv^ould tip the balance either w^ay. I supplied 
 the straw^. 
 
 While the vs^iseacres vv^ere at their delibera- 
 tions, I asked my guards if they vv^ould object 
 to my w^riting and mailing a postcard. As I 
 expected, they gladly gave permission, think- 
 ing of course that I v^ould in some vs^ay entrap 
 myself. 
 
 I addresesd my card to the British consul at 
 Rotterdam. I had crossed the border, I said, 
 in citizen's clothing, and had been taken pris- 
 oner by a Dutch outpost. I asked that if I had 
 not reached Rotterdam next morning the con- 
 sul w^ould take steps to see that I was not fur- 
 ther interfered vv^ith. 
 
 It w^as a clumsy enough ruse, trumped up 
 hurriedly to meet the exigency of the moment. 
 But it w^orked. The soldiers show^ed the card 
 to the commandant. The commandant, see- 
 ing me thus officially (?) connected w^ith the 
 British Government, did not dare to return me 
 to Germany. Instead, he let me go. 
 
 I had no money at all. But in Sevenaar I 
 had a nodding acquaintance with a tavern 
 keeper, and he took a chance and loaned me 
 the few shillings needed to travel third class to 
 Rotterdam. Third class w^as quite good 
 enough for me, in my greasy clothes and with 
 a tattered old shavv^l wrapped about my neck. 
 
In the train I met an escaped French pris- 
 oner of war who w^as being taken to Rotter- 
 dam by Dutch soldiers. He had escaped from 
 the mines at Duesberg, as had many others. 
 The train was scarcely in motion w^hen a well- 
 dressed man, evidently a German, engaged 
 the prisoner in conversation. 
 
 To me, in my old clothes, no one paid much 
 attention. The w^ell-dressed man asked the 
 Dutch soldiers, casually enough, how the 
 Frenchman had escaped. They shrugged 
 their shoulders and declined to speculate. But 
 the Frenchman started to tell his whole story. 
 I kicked him in the shins, and when he con- 
 tinued to talk, I said to him in French : 
 
 "My friend, it is a good rule never to talk 
 on trains. This man speaking to you is a Ger- 
 man. If he finds out howr you got aw^ay, you 
 may be sure no more of your comrades w^ill 
 have a chance to escape." 
 
 I could see by the twitching of the German's 
 cheek that he was very much excited by the 
 episode. But he said nothing, and at the next 
 station left the train. At the same station a 
 Belgian got into our compartment, and soon 
 engaged the Frenchman in conversation. 
 Again he started to tell his story. Again I 
 shut him off, and this time deliberately ac- 
 cused the Belgian of being a German spy. I 
 should say here that the rank and file of the 
 German espionage service in Holland is com- 
 posed of Belgians. In saying that, I mean only 
 men and women born in Belgium. The Bel- 
 gians as a people are loyal, faithful and patri- 
 ae 
 
otic, just as they have been pictured to the 
 world. The Belgian born who are in the 
 Kaiser's secret service are no more true Bel- 
 gians than Benedict Arnold w^as a true Ameri- 
 can. There are parasites w^hose motto is, 
 **Gold is w^orth as much under one flag as an- 
 other." 
 
 During my trip the Germans had w^ired 
 through from Sevenaar that there w^as a Ger- 
 man deserter on the train. At Rotterdam, be- 
 fore w^e could leave the raiWay terminal, we 
 were obliged to pass inspection by the military 
 authorities. As I passed before the officer in 
 command, a German spy was standing by his 
 side. 
 
 "Hello!" he hailed me. '* You're a German 
 deserter, aren't you?" 
 
 I gave him a glassy eye that vvrould have 
 been a how^ling success in any countryhouse 
 in England. "What the bally deuce do you 
 mean?" I asked him, cuttingly, "by saying 
 that sort of thing?" 
 
 It took me through. He w^ilted. 
 
 When 1 was in Rotterdam before, on my 
 assignment in the German secret service, 1 had 
 spent money lavishly. Now^ it stood me in 
 good stead. From a barber w^hom I had 
 treated generously, I procured clothes in which 
 to make a decent appearance. My riding togs, 
 alas, w^ere gone forever now! 
 
 Once rendered presentable, I sought my old 
 haunts. Pool's and the Cafe Swiss, to hear the 
 gossip of what was going on. After hanging 
 about there long enough to get my bearings I 
 
 37 
 
went to a hotel, and fell in with some Belgians 
 w^ho knew of my connection with the espion- 
 age service. 
 
 You might think that once in Holland my 
 troubles w^ould be over; and, indeed, those of 
 them that involved personal injury or recapture 
 were; but I had a great many other difficulties 
 to overcome before I could feel, in a manner 
 of speaking, firm ground beneath my feet. For 
 once having got into Holland, my next step 
 was to get out of it — on the side farthest from 
 Germany — and how I was to do that was, for 
 the time being, quite beyond me. But I man- 
 aged to do it at last. 
 
 I lived in a restaurant in Rotterdam, know^n 
 by the name of Simon's, a great rendezvous for 
 Belgian spies ; and in the course of a short time 
 got to know^ these gentlemen intimately. To 
 them I told my story, and expressed my desire 
 to be quit of Holland, and to get back to my 
 old home in South Africa. 
 
 *'Well," said one of the them, "have no more 
 fears on that score. If the thing can be done — 
 and 1 think I can — vv^e w^ill do it for you. At 
 any rate, you may be sure of our help, and that 
 is aWays something." 
 
 These men w^ere as good as their word. They 
 guaranteed my bills in Simon's, w^here there 
 w^as a sort of lodging house upstairs. At one 
 time, that section of the house may have been 
 roomy enough, but at the time of w^hich I 
 speak, it vv^as, to say the least, congested. The 
 owner had divided the room into many smaller 
 chambers by the erection of w^ooden parti- 
 
 38 
 
tions; and each room so made had space for 
 little besides an occupant, and a not over large 
 bed. The partitions were exceedingly thin, 
 and for that reason were practically non-exist- 
 ent so far as sound w^as concerned, so that 
 w^hen I w^as not sleeping I was being enter- 
 tained w^ith a variety of conversation on every 
 know^n subject, for I could hear everything 
 that w^as said on my floor. It w^as very inter- 
 esting. 
 
 I have mentioned, I think, that I tried the 
 British authorities first, but w^ithout success. 
 This time I w^as to have better luck in another 
 direction. After three w^eeks spent at Simon's, 
 a member of the Belgian espionage system 
 took me to the French Military Attache at The 
 Hague. 
 
 I repeated my story in full to that official, 
 and, after he had put a great many shrew^d 
 questions to me, calculated to upset my story 
 altogether if the w^hole vsras not founded on 
 fact, he assured me that if everything w^as as 
 I said, the British would play the game, and 
 allow^ me to get through into England. As an 
 evidence of my sincerity and good faith, he 
 then ordered me to visit Mr. Holdert of the 
 Amsterdam "Telegraaf," and give him the 
 inside story of the vs^orkings of the German 
 espionage system in Rotterdam. 
 
 Such a story w^ould prove conclusively to 
 both sides that I w^as w^ith the Allies. I visited 
 Mr. Holdert accordingly, and gave him the 
 story ; and the next morning it appeared in full 
 in the pages of the ''Telegraaf." 
 
 39 
 
I 'was then sent back to Rotterdam to await 
 final orders from the French Military Attache, 
 which w^ould be conveyed to me through the 
 Belgian spies. I remained in Simon's Hotel 
 for a w^eek, and at the end of that time w^as 
 ordered to report to Flushing, w^here the Bel- 
 gians took me before the British consul. 
 
 Tliat official then issued me a passport that 
 would take me safely across the Channel and 
 allow^ me to enter England. He informed me 
 that I w^as to embark for England on the fol- 
 low^ing morning and that I w^ould be expected 
 at Tillbury Docks, w^here the boat w^ould land. 
 
 Accordingly, the following morning I 
 boarded my vessel, the S. S. Princess Juliana, 
 and set sail for England. There w^ere about a 
 hundred people aboard, among whom the 
 South African got along very well; and after 
 the voyage, remarkable for nothing in particu- 
 lar, we arrived safely at Tillbury Docks. 
 
 At the docks the pasengers vs^ere marshaled 
 into line to aw^ait, each in turn, an inspection 
 and general going over by the military. Upon 
 going ashore I began to cast my eyes about for 
 the gentleman I w^as told w^ould meet me. 
 There w^as a great concourse of people in the 
 enclosure, and I had not not been told what 
 sort of man to expect, but I spotted him im- 
 mediately. To a man w^ith a detective's train- 
 ing, there are certain marks about other detec- 
 tives that are unmistakable. The man 1 sin- 
 gled out had them in a high degree. I walked 
 up to him at once, and gave him my name. He 
 raised his eyebrows in surprise, and regarded 
 
 40 
 
me with a comical expression of astonishment. 
 
 "Well," he said at last, "that beats me!" 
 
 I laughed at his wonder and told him it was 
 a simple enough thing to do; that it was not a 
 piece of black magic as he semed to think. He 
 then took me immediately to the military 
 officer w^ho w^as examining the passengers. 
 This surprised me, for I had expected to stand 
 in line and wait my turn. But I was evidently 
 considered a person of some importance, for 
 we avoided the crowd altogether and went into 
 the office by a side door. 
 
 My detective introduced me to the captain, 
 w^ho shook hands with me very cordially and 
 welcomed me to England. When he had gone 
 over my papers and we had had some small con- 
 versation together, the captain asked me where 
 I was going to stay! Here was news, indeed! 
 I had confidently expected to be herded into 
 some detention camp and kept there to await 
 the pleasure of the British Government. But 
 no; the captain assured me that I was a free 
 agent and that I might stop at any hotel that 
 appealed to my fancy. 1 can give you no ade- 
 quate idea of how that news w^armed my heart. 
 I had returned to England with a great many 
 misgivings as to the manner of my reception; 
 I had hoped to be treated well, I had feared the 
 opposite. But lo! I was received w^ith open 
 arms, and in a manner that indicated I was 
 completely trusted. 
 
 That evening the detective took me to Lon- 
 don, direct to Scotland Yard. We were too 
 late to see Acting Governor Thompson; and 
 
 41 
 
so, in company with Sergeant Ginhoven, an 
 old Dutchman in the detective service, I went 
 out to seek a hotel. I decided on one in a very 
 short time; not because of its desirability or 
 elegance, but because of its nearness to the 
 Yard. The next morning I saw^ Mr. Thomp- 
 son and the military authorities. They asked 
 me to make a detailed report of all the informa- 
 tion I had in my posession concerning the Ger- 
 man spy system. 
 
 I returned to the hotel immediately, and 
 wrote the report on the back of the hotel letter 
 paper, and submitted it. I w^as informed rather 
 curtly that the report would as handed in 
 w^ould not serve; that I, as a competent detec- 
 tive, should have know^n better than to make 
 out a report of that sort in such a manner. In 
 short, I w^as ordered to make out the report all 
 over again; this time on legal foolscap. 
 
 It required four w^eeks to verify the truth of 
 the assertion I made in my report, during 
 w^hich time I had many very pleasant days in 
 London. Indeed, I began to feel very much at 
 home, until one day I was brought up short, 
 and was forced to realize that my position in 
 the community was not what I had imagined it 
 to be. It came about in this w^ay. I had men- 
 tioned to Sergeant Ginhoven that I did not 
 care for the hotel at w^hich I w^as stopping. 
 
 *'Well,*' said he, "there are no chains on you 
 my dear, sir. Go anywrhere you please.'* 
 
 Accordingly, the next morning w^e w^ent to 
 Southampton Row, and applied at a private 
 hotel just opposite the Bedford, w^here I had 
 
 42 
 
stopped on my previous eventful trip to Lon- 
 don. The proprietor of the hotel at which v^e 
 applied w^as a grim, dour Scotchman, and 
 when Sergeant Ginhoven told him I was a 
 German, he looked me over with a cold, un- 
 friendly eye. 
 
 *A German!*' he cried. **See here, sir, my 
 father is the greatest hater of Germans in all 
 England; if I was to take him in, he would 
 never forgive me. He'd never live under the 
 same roof with him, and that's a certainty. 
 This is a private hotel, you know, and I don't 
 have to take him in. No, no," he added, *'he 
 cannot come in here." And he shut his mouth 
 tightly, and looked grimmer than ever. 
 
 This was like a dash of cold water to me. It 
 dampened all my former happiness. I had be- 
 gun to fancy myself on an equal footing with 
 all 1 saw or met, and to find one of them dis- 
 criminating against me, made me feel very 
 much alone, and very much of an outsider. I 
 turned away with something of a heavy heart, 
 but Sergeant Ginhoven, who saw my depres- 
 sion, laughed the whole thing off good 
 naturedly, and bade me cheer up. 
 
 Once outside, he called a taxi, and took me 
 to the Strand Palace, in the Strand. 1 found 
 the Strand Palace to be an excellent hotel, 
 filled with military officers. The hotel, I was 
 glad to learn, was a public one, and its man- 
 ager a Swiss. When Sergeant Ginhoven 
 asked him if he would take in a German for 
 whom the government would pay liberally, he 
 smiled broadly and asked, "Why not?" 
 
 43 
 
''Besides/' he added, *'here we have to take 
 every one. And to be frank, it makes little 
 difference to me v^rhat you are. You are vs^el- 
 come for your ow^n sake.** 
 
 At that, I felt a great deal better. I should 
 have said that the British Government vv^as 
 paying my expenses at the hotel, and allowing 
 me plenty of spending money besides; so that, 
 altogether I had a very pleasant time during 
 the weeks that ensued. I traveled all over Lon- 
 don, and so far as I know, was never spied 
 upon. 
 
 At the end of the fourth week I was sum- 
 moned to Scotland yard. When I entered the 
 office I found my self confronting several 
 gentlemen. There were Acting Governor of 
 Scotland Yard Thompon, a Captain Carter, 
 a naval officer, and several others. When I 
 entered Mr. Thompson rose and greeted me; 
 then he took a paper from his desk and wrent 
 over the points of information I had furnished 
 him with. When he had finished he laid his 
 hand on a sum of money which was lying on 
 his desk. The money, he told me, was mine, 
 in payment for my services. Captain Carter 
 then got up, and in a short, hearty speech, 
 thanked me in the name of the British Gov- 
 ernment, ending his talk by informing me that 
 I w^as to go abroad a steamer bound for New 
 York the following morning. Everything had 
 been arranged by them beforehand, and all I 
 had to do was to walk aboard. My getting out 
 of the country w^as necessary by reason of the 
 law that no enemy alien may remain in Eng- 
 
 44 
 
land. And so, after shaking hands all around, 
 I bade good-bye to them and to England. 
 
 On the voyage to New York I again became 
 known as the **South African.'* The pas- 
 sengers were all exceedingly kind to me; but 
 better than that, I met a most charming Eng- 
 lish lady aboard, who has since become my 
 w^ife. 
 
 And now that I am in New York I can see 
 that the results of my apparently foolish thirst 
 for adventure are many and beneficial. 1 have 
 got a liberal education in self-dependency; my 
 wits have been sharpened and my mind broad- 
 ened ; I have gone through adventures that w^ill 
 remain in my memory when all the drab com- 
 monplaces of life have faded from it — and last 
 and best, I have got a v^ife. And the last con- 
 sideration alone was worth it all. 
 
 45 
 
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